FDA Approves New Combo Therapy for Kidney Cancer

The FDA approved Merck’s Bavencio (avelumab) in combination with Pfizer’s Inlyta (axitinib) as a front-line treatment for kidney cancer.

Bavencio is the first programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) protein therapy to be approved as part of a combination to treat kidney cancer.

The approval comes after Merck and Pfizer handed up data from a Phase 3 study, showing that patients who took the combination averaged five more months of progression-free survival than patients taking Pfizer’s Sutent (sunitinib).